September 20, 2011: In Kabul, Burhanuddin Rabbani, the former president of Afghanistan (1992-6) and head of the effort to negotiate a peace deal with the Taliban, was killed by two suicide bombers. The two killers used a bomb hidden in a turban and waited two days to meet with Rabbani (pretending to be Taliban couriers delivering a verbal message).
Some Taliban groups took credit for the attack, while others insisted the Taliban had nothing to do with it. Afghan and American intelligence believe the attack was carried out by Pakistani intelligence (ISI) to cripple peace talks with the Taliban.
ISI apparently used Haqqani to disrupt peace talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government. These peace efforts have been chipping away at the Taliban over the years, enticing tribal factions to drop (or greatly reduce) support for the Taliban. ISI cannot tolerate this.
Nobody wants 'em,
Everybody hates 'em
Might as well eat worms
('Cause they're in tunnels -- get it?)
(Ma'an) -- Egyptian security forces jugged four Paleostinians on Wednesday who had entered Egypt through underground tunnels connecting to the Gazoo Strip.
Egyptian authorities said that their visas to enter Egypt had expired and they are still investigating the reason for their entry to Egypt.
Egyptian security officials said that the low number of passengers allowed to enter Egypt via the Rafah crossing leads people to try and enter the country illegally via other routes.
CAIRO: Egypts emergency law will be in place until June next year, the ruling military said on Wednesday, dashing demands by protesters for a swift end to the code that rights groups say was used by former leader Hosni Mubarak to stifle dissent.
In June they'll extend it for another year. Lather, rinse, repeat...
The law was extended for two years in mid-2010 when Mubarak was in power. Protesters who ousted the former president from office in February have demanded it be lifted.
The ruling army said it was reactivating emergency law after an attack by protesters on Israels embassy this month, which prompted Israel to withdraw its ambassador. The army said it would be used to stop thuggery and other crimes.
General Adel Morsi, head of the military judicial authority, said the law was extended by presidential decree for two years ending on June 30, 2012, the state news agency MENA said. He said reports suggesting it would be removed were wrong.
One top general had been quoted by newspapers saying the law would be lifted as soon as possible. Prime Minister Essam Sharaf, appointed by the military council now ruling Egypt, was quoted by state-owned Al-Akbar newspaper that emergency law was in place to protect the revolution.
We have been denouncing the state of emergency since before the revolution, said Ahmed Maher, a senior member of the April 6 movement which helped galvanize anti-Mubarak protests. We reject the decision by the military council as we see no reason for it if the criminal law is implemented."
Other activists and politicians have also said Egypts legal system can deal with violent crimes without the need to resort to special emergency courts. The law was in place during Mubaraks three decades in office.
We have ongoing awareness campaigns distributing flyers and mobilizing people against the state of emergency, said Maher.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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How would that be different from the current situation?
Quantity. They'll need to expand the morgue...
SANAA: The grim prospect of civil war in Yemen has drawn closer as mutinous soldiers have become more deeply involved in a rapidly spreading battle against regime forces for control of the capital.
A negotiated cease-fire Tuesday halted three days of fighting that killed dozens of people, but it will not hold without a quick resolution of the key dispute: Who will lead the nation.
A peaceful way out of Yemen's seven-month crisis may not come easily, if at all, making it more likely to be settled in large-scale and ruinous street battles pitting renegade army soldiers and their allied tribal fighters against US-trained forces loyal to embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh and led by his son and one-time heir apparent, Ahmed.
Already, pro-regime forces reinforced their positions in their strongholds in the south of the capital, apparently in anticipation of renewed fighting. The potential for bloody strife has been shown in Yemen since the uprising against Saleh's regime began in February, with hundreds of protesters killed and thousands wounded at the hands of security forces.
In the past three days, pro-regime forces killed more than 70 people, mostly protesters, using anti-aircraft guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars. At least 23 people were killed in Sanaa on Tuesday as the fighting intensified and spread to sensitive areas of the capital before the cease-fire took hold after nightfall.
In one incident, 13 followers of a tribal leader who changed sides and joined the opposition in March were killed when mortar shells fired by pro-government forces rained down on the upscale Hedah area of southern Sanaa, also home to top regime figures.
"It's a war zone," said Sanaa activist Hakim Al-Masmari. "We can't even sit near windows because we could be killed."
Thousands have been forced to flee Sanaa for the relative safety of rural areas. Scores of pickup trucks and cars loaded with families and their belongings were seen early Tuesday heading out of the city, repeatedly shaken by loud explosions overnight.
The United States condemned the violence and called on all parties to exercise restraint. "We urge a prompt, impartial investigation into the events that led to the recent violence," Victoria Nuland, the State Department's spokeswoman, said in a statement Tuesday.
With the prospect of a peaceful settlement remote, civil war becomes a realistic possibility, given that Yemen is a nation with deep tribal and regional divides, a checkered history of civil strife, and a chronically weak central government. The nation's north and the once-independent south fought it out in 1994. Another civil war would pit the renegade soldiers of the 1st Armored Division, perhaps the nation's most combat-tested unit, against the Republican Guards led by Ahmed to decide the leadership question.
The 1st Armored Division claims about 20,000 fighters in Sanaa, and, according to security officials, has been training its men in urban warfare for most of the six months since it defected along with its commander, Maj. Gen. Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmar, and joined the anti-Saleh protesters. The division has tanks and armored personnel carriers but they have been hidden across the city to avoid being picked off by regime warplanes.
The Republican Guards boast much more armor, a large arsenal of rockets and about the same number of troops. As a backup, it can draw on the support of the US-trained and equipped Special Forces, another elite unit also led by Saleh's son, and the Presidential Guards, led by Saleh's nephew, Tariq, a commander notorious for brutality.
"The Republican Guards are the superior force on paper," said military expert Hussein Mansour, a retired army brigadier. "But that makes little difference on the ground. It is all about street warfare and combat expertise."
The division, which took part in every war fought in Yemen in the past three decades, also has Al-Ahmar for a seasoned commander whose combat experience is complemented by years as Saleh's point man on the country's complex tribal politics.
Ahmed, by contrast, has little combat experience and support outside segments of the military and several small tribes still loyal to him and his father.
The 1st Armored Division has endeared itself to the thousands of protesters camped in Sanaa's central Change Square since its mutiny in March, pledging to protect them from by pro-regime forces.
The protesters have given the division weapons seized this week from a Republican Guards' camp in the city and government buildings as part of a stepped-up campaign against the regime. Unarmed, they also acted as human shields for the soldiers, providing them with cover until new positions in the capital were built and fortified.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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Relatively speaking. We'll know it's really booming when we start seeing obese North Koreans out in the countryside...
The underground economy in Stalinist North Korea is growing rapidly, spy agencies believe. A South Korean security official said, "It seems the planned economy remains in name only while in fact the capitalist underground economy prevails."
Goodness. Even the most Stalinist of old-fashioned Communists turn out to secretly be rampant capitalists.
A class of transport tycoons is emerging who own and operate passenger buses throughout the North, according to a source familiar with North Korea.
Individuals are in principle banned from owning cars, despite the regime's habit of buying the loyalty of party officials with gifts of luxury cars. But many people now import vehicles from China or other countries and register them in the borrowed names of agencies or enterprises to which they pay kickbacks of 10 to 15 percent of their profits.
Other entrepreneurs buy small 3 to 5-ton wooden boats equipped with Chinese-made motors and GPS navigation and then hire villagers to catch fish or dig for clams. Some entrepreneurs have whole flotillas of fishing boats.
Maybe they use them for smuggling, both goods into the country and people out. That's much more lucrative than fish...
Other rich North Koreans invest money in new kinds of business, including extraction of natural resources. One North Korean tycoon has procured equipment and materials for a state-run coal mine where he extracted coal by employing about 20 workers, the source said.
Money lenders do not merely practice usury but act as informal banks by paying trade bills as middlemen for both North Korean and Chinese traders.
The rationing system, the backbone of the socialist planned economy, has nearly collapsed. Some 4 million people still live on rations -- 2.6 million in Pyongyang and 1.2 million soldiers.
But a senior South Korean government official said 20 million North Koreans rely absolutely on the underground economy. "A North Korean family needs 90,000-100,000 North Korean won for living costs per month, but workers at state-run factories or enterprises earn a mere 2,000-8,000 won," the source said. "So North Koreans have no choice but to become market traders, cottage industrialists or transport entrepreneurs to make up for shortages."
Many stores, restaurants, and beauty parlors are privately owned. Private tutors teach music or foreign languages. Carpenters have evolved as quasi-manufacturers who receive orders and make furniture on a massive scale. They earn 80,000-90,000 won per month on average.
In other words, barely enough to live on. They're running furiously just to stand in one place.
It is common to find people in front of railway stations or in markets who wait to earn a few extra won by carrying luggage or purchases in their handcarts. Like taxis, their fees are calculated on a basic fee and the distance covered.
In the countryside, people earn money by selling corn or beans grown in their own vegetable gardens in the back yard or in the hills. They can harvest 700 kg of corn a year from a 1,600 sq.m. lot. And by selling 50 kg of corn a month they make 30,000-40,000 won on top of their daily living costs.
"Ordinary North Koreans have become so dependent on the private economy that they get 80-90 percent of daily necessities and 60-70 percent of food from the markets," the security official said.
The growing private economy has led to a redistribution of resources from the planned economy to the market. This has weakened the regime's financial capacity while boosting the economic power of individuals.
"Massive aid of food or daily necessities from outside would only revive the dying planned economy and rationing system, while increasing the regime's ability to control the market," another senior South Korean government official said. "We need to be prudent in giving lavish aid, which could just be used by the regime to oppress people."
Yup, just takes another good push for people to ask the question that proves fatal to despots around the world: "Say, you guys are kinda stupid. Who put you in charge?"
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Seems like a storehouse of energy and ingenuity yearning to be free, as it were.
A French police court has issued its first fines against two women charged with wearing the full-face covering Islamic niqab.
Police have issued several on-the-spot fines since the ban came into effect in April but these are the first court-issued fines, with the women vowing to appeal their case all the way to the European Court of Human Rights.
Hind Ahmas, 32, was ordered to pay a 120-euro fine, while Najate Nait Ali, 36, was fined 80 euros. The court did not order them to take a citizenship course, as had been requested by the prosecutor.
The two women arrived too late to attend the court's deliberations.
One of the women had not been allowed into the court in May because she refused to take off her niqab to show her face.
Yann Gre from the Don't Touch My Constitution association that is defending the two women who were arrested in May in front of the town hall of Meaux, around 50 kilometres east of Paris, says they will appeal.
He says if the fines are confirmed by a higher court, they will take their case to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
"This law forbids women in niqab from leaving their homes and going out in public. It's a kind of life-sentence to prison," he said.
The women were arrested in May when they brought a birthday cake for mayor and MP Jean-Francois Cope, also head of president Nicolas Sarkozy's right-wing UMP party that pushed Europe's first anti-burka law through parliament.
Mr Cope was instrumental in getting the ban's scope expanded from official buildings to anywhere on the street, according to Don't Touch My Constitution.
French officials estimate that only around 2,000 women, from a total Muslim population estimated at between four and six million, wear the full-face veils that are traditional in parts of the Arab world and South Asia.
#7
I'm not sure I like this. It depends on why a woman is wearing the niqab.
If the purpose is to intimidate or make a political statement of Islamic dominance - like a towering minaret, or an armband - no problem.
If the purpose is to be able to go about their daily business without getting raped or killed by Islamofascist animals, then I have a big problem with blaming the victim.
It sounds like the law does not discriminate between the two, because criminalizing behavior that depends on the reason a person did it is antithetical to Western law in general. Which means the law captures both, which is why I'm not wild about it. Fining niqab-wearers targets the symptom, not the disease. Anyone agree/disagree?
You're kidding right? France used to be included in Western Civilization. The solution for people who need to wear niqabs to avoid barbaric behavior is to not change Western Civilization into the barbaric culture.
Perhaps these women would feel more comfortable in an islamic country more appropriate to their tastes.
Please don't let "islamofascist animals" and their ways into our culture. They're trying to change our culture in our civilization. And it's been a pretty good civilization for the most part.
#10
Agree with JH. If the reason for a niqab is Islamofascist animals then let's get rid of the animals; cage them, put them down or move them to "old" pastures, but DON'T give in to them.
If it's a religious purpose, move to somewhere that does not consider niqabs offensive in both senses of the word.
#11
lotp, a secular state banning religious garment is the biggest example I know of something that in the modern world could even *potentially* be called atheist intolerance against the religious.
But if this is not it, then can you pinpoint me
to examples of where "Intolerance is the atheist way" as was claimed? And also where in the modern world atheists are doing their supposed best to make sure people that follow "deist religions" can't follow them?
#12
Aris, France has a history of fully veiled individuals stealing from shops. Once in flight, they cannot be identified from other similarly clad persons who may or may not be female. How is one to say, after only a brief glimpse, that this particular Moving Black Object is the one that robbed you some minutes ago, when the police dare not even touch her, let alone search her person? This is not a religious issue, but one of public safety.
There is also the culture thingy -- in the West we do not hide our faces from the world. Nor does Islam require it, although there are ethnic cultures which do.
#13
trailing wife, I don't oppose France's decision, though my reasoning for it isn't the same yours. Mown reasoning is that I support acts that in *practice* favor freedom, and Islamic dress is too often made mandatory (whether officially by Islamic authorities, or unofficially by Muslims gangs) that to ban it is most likely pro-freedom in practice, counter-intuitive though it can seem.
My point is that if this isn't an example "atheist intolerance against the religious", nothing else in the current world qualifies, so as an atheist I see fit to challenge previous statements spoken in this forum about how "Intolerance is the atheist way".
#16
Steve, if you have a real-life example I'm not familiar with, please see fit to enlighten me. (Keep in mind I'm talking about the current world, so French revolutionaries guillotining priests, or the Albanian communists banning religion, doesn't count)
#17
An example of atheist intolerance of the religious is seen here in the US with the banning of display by any public institution of the Ten Commandments. Also the banning of manger scenes on public property.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
09/22/2011 15:37 Comments ||
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#18
'When in Rome...'
How is covering your face religious? Especially when it only is for women? Our western civilization is all about freedom, assimilate.
Also TW makes a great point regarding safety. I'll add driver's licenses to this as well.
Posted by: Jan ||
09/22/2011 15:44 Comments ||
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#19
so as an atheist I see fit to challenge previous statements spoken in this forum about how "Intolerance is the atheist way".
#20
"An example of atheist intolerance of the religious is seen here in the US with the banning of display by any public institution of the Ten Commandments."
Commanding the *government* institutions NOT to endorse a religion, is hardly intolerance against the religious.
That's merely not accepting the open violation of the church-state separation. I doubt the religious would accept the display of openly atheist statements like "There is no God" in public institutions either.
Instead you have "In God We Trust" in your money, and "One nation under God" in your pledge to the flag. If these words were replaced by "We Trust there's no God" and "One nation under an absence of Gods" (which I'm NOT proposing) -- I'm sure you'd consider this to be atheist intolerance; but the presence of the religious equivalent you don't so consider...
I'm sure the forum will recover from me hijacking a single thread every couple years or so.
It's midnight over here besides. According to my experience from past threads, soon after I go to bed and no longer respond, at least one of you will call me a troll, at least one person will bring up my Greek ancestry and Greece's bankruptcy, and atleast one person (probably Frank) will produce some truly outrageous comments that will make me despair of humanity when I happen to read them tomorrow morning in what will be now a locked thread for me.
Posted by: Jan ||
09/22/2011 17:10 Comments ||
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#23
Aris, you are a bankrupt Greek troll. But as long as you can get the Germans to pay for it, go for it. I'll leave the rest up to Frank. And I really believe you're Fred in disguise trying to drive up the comment count.
#24
Aren't next-day comments are locked for everybody? That would seem fair, anyway. Especially, in light of Greeks bearing gifts of their infinite, inexhaustable wisdom.
This has nothing to do with religious intolerance. We form a society. In order to communicate we want to see the face of the person we are communicating with.
The niqab (not the veal, mind you) "dehumanizes" the person wearing it, it makes the woman "invisible", a "no-person". She is no longer part of society but just a moving black bag.
This is not acceptable in a Western civilization. It should be in no other civilization as well.
Religion has nothing to do with this law. I fully support it.
Posted by: European Conservative ||
09/22/2011 18:00 Comments ||
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#27
umm the veil rather
Posted by: European Conservative ||
09/22/2011 18:02 Comments ||
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#28
Aris: don't hijack any more threads. Consider this a friendly warning, even though you and I aren't friends.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 18:22 Comments ||
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#29
Aw, Doc White, this little hijacking was actually pretty reasonable - amusing even.
#34
asecular state banning religious garment is the biggest example I know of something that in the modern world could even *potentially* be called atheist intolerance against the religious.
But if this is not it, then can you pinpoint me
Try Singapore, Aris.
They actively "manage" religions and any that go against integration are heavily leant on. Muslims have always been leant on but others like Christian groups who embraced Liberation Theology also came under the microscope.
Just some examples of how they attampt to manage Muslims are:
All committees/management of mosques must submit a list of names to the government and the government then decide which names get to run the mosque on an annual basis.
Every Friday sermon must be submitted to the government. The sermon is also monitored and any deviation can result in the mosque being closed down.
80% of housing is government owned in high rise flats which ring the city. When a Muslim is allocated a flat, the bureaucrats actively ensures the the Muslim is as far away from a mosque, family members and other Muslims as they can manage. They basically want to drown them in a sea of Chinese.
No affirmative nonsense.
There are lots more. The Muslims don't like it but if they complain they are pointed out the Malaysian border and told to hop on their bike.
LOS ANGELES (CBS) -- Federal agencies were working with Southwest Airlines on Thursday to determine who has been vandalizing their aircraft with mysterious markings.
KNX 1070 investigative news hound Charles Feldman has learned that since February, several Southwest jets have been vandalized with mysterious writings that show up on the underbelly of their 737 passenger aircraft.
The writings -- which some have interpreted as being either Arabic or Arabic-type symbols -- appeared to have been done with a chemical process that reveals the text once an auxiliary power unit is turned on and heats up the outside skin of the aircraft, according to Feldman.
#6
promotes confidence knowing that access to these jets with chemical tagging has been going on. Let's check grandma's shoes, but allow the terrorists access to these jets.
Posted by: Jan ||
09/22/2011 10:44 Comments ||
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#7
You got it all wrong guys. It is an advertisement for the local Hummus store, the arab equivalent of "Eat At Joe's".
/sarc
Seriously, Jan has the basic facts right. Security at the front is always the hardest, but there are always a ton of weak spots in the rear for the workers and the day to day operations. It is simply too inconvenient to put a huge security burden on the background work and would make the entire operation grind to a halt if implemented.
The CIA, MI6 and others know this. So do terrorists.
#8
might this be merely a problem using a maintenance protocol with the wrong instruments and wrong chemicals; it seems pretty tangential to the jihad
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
09/22/2011 11:00 Comments ||
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#9
If terrorists had access, why didn't the blow one up yet? I'm also wondering how many terrorists are sophisticated enough to figure out the chemical reaction to heat at that exact spot on the plane. Maybe somebody is quietly trying to tell us that security is lax.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
09/22/2011 11:53 Comments ||
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#10
Technology is available to these buggers, make no mistake. For a price, the usual suspects (China, Pakistan, Russia, Iran, North Korea) will gladly provide them with the tools and knowledge necessary to shove it up our asses.
#11
Abu U, good point, however these may be test runs. Catching a shuttle to the airport when the workers are commuting makes me wonder how well they have been vetted. English doesn't seem to be any of their first languages. Not a racist just an observation.
Posted by: Jan ||
09/22/2011 15:25 Comments ||
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WASHINGTON: The US has accused the ISI of using the Haqqani network to wage a 'proxy war', hardening its criticism of Islamabad's ties with Taliban-allied factions fighting NATO and Afghan troops in Afghanistan.
Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that in a discussion with Pakistan's army chief that lasted about four hours, he had pressed Pakistan to break its links with the group.
Washington blames the Haqqani network for last week's attack on the US embassy and other targets in Kabul. The Pakistan government denies that it still has ties to the Haqqanis.
"The Haqqanis are the product of the Soviet Union and Afghan war, and we were partners and they are sons of the soil," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told reporters.
That doesn't exactly sound like a denial...
The Washington Post reported that US officials had delivered an ultimatum to Islamabad in recent days, warning that if it did not cut ties with the Haqqani network and help eliminate its leaders then "the United States will act unilaterally".
That means more drones shooting missiles at sons of the soil we followed back to their ISI-organized sanctuaries in Pakistan. Not to mention the other ones we've been watching with our spy satellites.
The US could step up drone attacks from Afghanistan in North Waziristan or launch long-range attacks on Haqqani hideouts as they did in their helicopter raid on bin Laden in a town just two hours up the road from Islamabad.
Launching a larger military operation would be extremely difficult in the mountainous terrain of North Waziristan and would risk hardening anti-American sentiment in Pakistan.
Not that you'd be able to tell...
A resolution to lingering Jammu and Kashmir dispute would unlock peace potential in South Asia in the long-term perspective, US military leader Admiral Mike Mullen noted.
"I've said a couple years ago, and I believe today, I think solving Kashmir unlocks the whole place, that's the path for long-term solutions," he said at think tank Carnegie Endowment for Interntional Peace. An analysis by Congressional Research Service, dicussing the importance of the issue to Pakistan-India relations, also found that "many US officials, as well as the Pakistani government, aver that regional peace is inextricably linked to a solution of the Kashmir dispute."
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
See also WORLD NEWS > PAKISTAN ISI URGED MILITANTS TO STRIKE US TARGETS.
#2
We have been fighting a proxy war against Pakistan for years in Afganistan who hope just like the Soviets that we see a US financial collapse in the outcome.(Check comments from Hamid Gul and Hafiz Saeed on this!)
But who is funding the proxy war on the Pak side?US indirectly/China/Iran/Russia or Saudi come to mind.
ISLAMABAD: I assured Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Robert Mueller that the Haqqanis are not on the Pakistani side, but if there was any intelligence, which was provided by the US, we would definitely take suitable action, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Wednesday.
Then he stopped moving his lips...
The Haqqanis are the product of the Soviet Union and the Afghan war, and we were partners and they are sons of the soil, Malik told reporters after a meeting with Mueller.
The FBI director is visiting Pakistan as tensions between two countries spike over US demands that Islamabad crack down on Afghan terrorists it says get shelter in Pakistan.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Well, good. I guess you won't mind if we kill any we happen to run across, then?
PARIS: A probe into alleged illegal campaign funding linked to a deadly 2002 Pakistan bombing drew closer to Nicolas Sarkozy, on Wednesday, with the French presidents best man and a former aide detained.
Investigators are examining an alleged system whereby money paid in arms sales commissions - legal at the time - were channelled back into the illegal funding of political activities in France.
It is alleged that a bombing in Karachi that killed 11 French engineers in 2002 was revenge for the cancellation of commissions promised to officials involved in the sale of French submarines to Pakistan. Magistrates are probing whether arms kickbacks were used to finance the 1994-95 presidential campaign of then-prime minister Edouard Balladur, whose budget minister and campaign spokesman was Sarkozy.
The police, on Wednesday, detained and questioned Balladurs then-cabinet chief and presidential campaign manager Nicolas Bazire over the alleged illegal party financing, a judicial source said. Sarkozys communications advisor until the mid-1990s, Thierry Gaubert, is due to be questioned on Wednesday by a magistrate after he was detained for questioning on Monday. Investigators are probing links between Gaubert and Franco-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine, who was charged last week with fraud over two arms contracts with Pakistan and Saudi Arabia in which he was allegedly middleman.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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September 22, 2011: Palestinian leaders are telling their followers that the UN will soon approve Palestinian use of terror against Israelis, even when it means killing women and children. One Palestinian official stated that the UN will back efforts to free Palestinians imprisoned by Israel for terror attacks. All this is supposed to happen when Palestine is allowed to join the UN. The Palestinian effort be obtain UN membership seems likely to succeed, and soon. This would not create a Palestinian state; it would simply make Palestine a member of the UN. This is a bizarre situation, but such things are not unknown in the UN.
The Palestinians have been discussing all the terrorist implications of UN membership in their Arab language media. Little has been said in English and other Western languages. Theres good reason for that. Many Western diplomats know exactly what the Palestinians are up to and have warned that UN membership, and all the lawfare games that would flow from it, will mean a sharp decline in Western aid. The UN bureaucrats have also warned the Palestinians that the UN will not go along with this interpretation of UN membership. But the Palestinians have long ignored reality, and UN warnings. Palestinian media continue to describe the ongoing war to exterminate Israel and kill or drive all Jews from the region. This doesnt get much attention in Western media, but its all over Arab language media (and not just the Palestinian outlets).
These odd, to Westerners, pronouncements are not new, or uncommon. Last December, just in time for Christmas, Palestinian Authority TV came out with shows extolling the fact (at least as far as Palestinians were concerned) that Jesus was a Palestinian and the first Palestinian martyr. Christians believe that the Romans executed Jesus to placate a faction of the Jewish clergy who opposed the message Jesus was putting out. Jesus was known as a popular rabbi, and was accused by the Romans of claiming to be "king of the Jews." Some Jews (who later became Christians) accepted Jesus as the long awaited messiah. But most Jews, and all Moslems, do not. Moslems believe Jesus was a prophet sent by God to the Semitic Jewish tribes of what is now Palestine. This is an important point, as Palestinian propaganda considers Jews who don't look Semitic (Arab) to be polluted by alien blood and thus not welcome. The Semitic Jews of Israel (the descendants of those expelled from Arab countries in the late 1940s) are also considered unwelcome, largely because they consorted with the invading Western Jews. These Jews from Arab countries look just like Arabs, and often join the intelligence services, since they make excellent undercover agents.
Palestinian propaganda, meant mainly for internal consumption, depicts all of Israel as "occupied Palestine" and holds that Jews (who have lived in the area continuously for over 3,000 years) have no right to be there. Arab Christians in the neighborhood, some of them descendants of those who were followers of Jesus, keep their heads down amidst all this, as the recent Palestinian propaganda also declared that Jesus was preaching Islam, over five centuries before Mohammed arrived on the scene. Religion can get you killed in this part of the world, but that doesn't seem to discourage radical interpretations of historical events.
Religious intolerance, as well as religious diversity, are both characteristic of the region. Islam arrived five centuries after Christianity and, like earlier new religions, attracted adherents. What was different about Islam was that it was aggressively seeking to persuade all conquered people to become Moslems. This did not always work, as there were often stubborn minorities. In the area that is now Israel and the Palestinian territories, there are several religions that survived, in one way or another, the Islamic conversion effort. The two most obvious groups were Christians (several different sects) and Jews (ditto). But there were others, most of who pretended to become Moslems, but did so on their own terms. Thus we have the Druze, several flavors of Shia, and others. These Moslem sects are considered heretics by many mainstream Sunni Moslems (especially hard core groups like the Wahhabi and al Qaeda).
For Palestinian propaganda purposes, it's possible to find enough hooks in the complex religious and ethnic history of the region to get many Moslems to believe that Jesus was not a Jew, but rather the first Palestinian martyr. The Arabs tend to keep stuff like this to them, thus you will only find these messages in the Arab language media. But it is always there, especially during the Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus.
Even the NYT sees that Bambi has beclowned himself; hence the furious, near sub-orbital spin in this piece to try and save support in the American Jewish communities for the Democrats -- and for the NYT...
UNITED NATIONS -- A last-ditch American effort to head off a Palestinian bid for membership in the United Nations faltered. President Obama tried to qualify his own call, just a year ago, for a Palestinian state. And President Nicolas Sarkozy of France stepped forcefully into the void, with a proposal that pointedly repudiated Mr. Obama's approach.
The extraordinary tableau Wednesday at the United Nations underscored a stark new reality: the United States is facing the prospect of having to share, or even cede, its decades-long role as the architect of Middle East peacemaking.
Even before Mr. Obama walked up to the General Assembly podium to make his difficult address, where he declared that "Peace will not come through statements and resolutions at the U.N.," American officials acknowledged that their various last-minute attempts to jump-start Israeli-Palestinian negotiations with help from European allies and Russia had collapsed.
American diplomats turned their attention to how to navigate a new era in which questions of Palestinian statehood are squarely on the global diplomatic agenda. There used to be three relevant players in any Middle East peace effort: the Palestinians, Israel and the United States. But expansions of settlements in the West Bank and a hardening of Israeli attitudes have isolated Israel and its main backer, the United States. Dissension among Palestinian factions has undermined the prospect for a new accord as well.
Finally, Washington politics has limited Mr. Obama's ability to try to break the logjam if that means appearing to distance himself from Israel. Republicans have mounted a challenge to lure away Jewish voters who supported Democrats in the past, after some Jewish leaders sharply criticized Mr. Obama for trying to push Israel too hard.
And as usual, the NYT blames Republicans. Not a word about why Obama pushed Israel or whether that was an erroneous strategy. Nope, it's the Pubs fault for taking advantage of Bambi's political ineptitude.
The result has been two and a half years of stagnation on the Middle East peace front that has left Arabs -- and many world leaders -- frustrated, and ready to try an alternative to the American-centric approach that has prevailed since the 1970s.
"The U.S. cannot lead on an issue that it is so boxed in on by its domestic politics," said Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator in the government of Ehud Barak. "And therefore, with the region in such rapid upheaval and the two-state solution dying, as long as the U.S. is paralyzed, others are going to have to step up."
Perhaps we'll be less paralyzed when President Perry or President Romney step up.
Further, why is it the duty of the U.S. to solve this problem? If Sarkozy and the French want to invest the time and cash into being disappointed over and again by the Paleos, well have at it. If the French were to succeed, fine. But they won't, and neither will anyone else, so long as the Paleos have the single goal of the destruction of Israel. Until they give that up the problem can't be solved, even if in the meantime the oceans recede.
Mr. Obama himself seemed to forecast this back in May when, speaking to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, he warned that events in the Middle East could lead to a challenge to the status quo if the Israelis and Palestinians did not move quickly toward a peace deal.
"There's a reason why the Palestinians are pursuing their interests at the United Nations," Mr. Obama said then. "They recognize that there is an impatience with the peace process, or the absence of one, not just in the Arab world, in Latin America, in Asia, and in Europe. And that impatience is growing, and it's already manifesting itself in capitals around the world."
The ineffectual Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, delivered on the threat. He announced last Friday his plans to go to the Security Council in a quest for Palestinian membership in the United Nations and international legal recognition of statehood, putting Mr. Obama in the position of having to stand in the way. Israel and its allies in Congress, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel enjoys broad influence, were sharply opposed.
So on Wednesday, Mr. Obama "did exactly what he had to do," said David Rothkopf, a former Clinton administration official and a visiting fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "He made a clear statement for what is a clear U.S. position and put himself squarely as a champion of the status quo."
Mr. Netanyahu, Mr. Rothkopf said, "has managed to read the U.S. political situation perfectly, making Obama acutely aware that he could be losing part of his base, and that, I think, in turn is what has locked Obama in."
Takes a brave politician to walk away from a position supported by 80% of his countrymen, and Bambi isn't that brave.
The Palestinians have never fully trusted the United States to serve as an honest broker with Israel. But its credibility with the Palestinians has crumbled with the recognition that Mr. Obama may not have the clout to press the Israelis into a peace deal that requires significant compromises.
Oh well, guess we should stay home and keep our money. Paleos can get their payments from France. We're just borrowing it from China or printing it at the Fed. Might as well keep it.
"The president in his speech at the U.N. today admitted that the U.S. somehow failed in bridging the gap between the two sides," the Palestinian representative in Washington, Maen Rashid Areikat, said in an interview on Wednesday. "He said that he feels frustration and he understands the frustration of everybody. That's good, but I think it goes much deeper. I think what the U.S. administration needs to say is why it failed."
He acknowledged the administration's efforts -- with the appointment of George J. Mitchell Jr. as special envoy to the region and Mr. Obama's own speeches, especially in Cairo -- but said the momentum of his early presidency flagged as the administration bound itself so closely to the Israelis and their supporters in the United States, especially Congress.
I don't think anyone saw Bambi binding himself closely to the Israelis; in fact, it was just the opposite. This is just more NYT revisionism, hoping that Jewish voters will buy the line that Bambi is bound to Israel. The fact is that Bambi would sell out the Israelis in a New York minute if he thought he could get away with it.
The Palestinians ultimately decided that the best hope for breaking an impasse with the Israelis rested with making their case to a larger international forum.
"One big reason for losing that momentum," he said, "was the failure of the administration to use its leverage with an Israeli government that adamantly was opposed to the efforts of the United States to bridge the gap in the Middle East."
No, the administration used its leverage, only to find that it didn't work anyway, because the Israelis weren't going to volunteer to be led to the slaughter. The average Israeli is as loyal to his country as we are to ours; said average Israeli isn't about to sign his country away, especially not to those who would murder him and his family without a second thought.
After Mr. Obama laid out his defense of the peace process, Mr. Sarkozy took to the same podium in a forceful disavowal of Mr. Obama's position. "Let us cease our endless debates on the parameters," he said, calling instead for a General Assembly resolution that would upgrade the Palestinians to "observer status" as a bridge toward statehood. "Let us begin negotiations, and adopt a precise timetable."
A timetable that favors the Paleos, because only Israel would be compelled to make concessions to meet the deadlines.
The outcome of the Palestinian bid for membership remains uncertain. The administration still hopes that the process of considering the Palestinian bid at the Security Council could provide a fresh opportunity for new talks. The move puts new pressure on Mr. Netanyahu's government, reeling from setbacks to its security from the turmoil of the Arab Spring, with results that analysts say are hard to forecast.
'Reeling'? Israel remains secure. No Arab country will challenge it directly. Hamas is trying to put a lid on the splinter groups in Gaza. The West Bank is its usual seething self. Lebanon is distracted, Assad is busy, Jordan is too smart to challenge the Israelis, and Egypt has its own problems.
But a quick return to the status quo, when the United States dictated the terms of talks, seems unlikely, given strong Russian and French support for a new approach by the Palestinians.
Let the Y'urp-peons support a new approach. In ten years we'll be back at the U.N. lamenting their failure.
Alain Juppe, the French foreign minister, told reporters after Mr. Sarkozy's speech that the United States "cannot do it alone" in negotiations for a Middle East peace, and that a collective approach was needed. Mr. Juppe said he thought this time that the five permanent Security Council members should have a direct role in shepherding talks.
Somewhat incongruously, Mr. Sarkozy visited Mr. Obama's hotel on Wednesday afternoon for a previously scheduled meeting with the president, and was effusive, in front of the cameras before the meeting, in his praise for Mr. Obama. Mr. Obama, for his part, refused to engage with reporters assembled for the photo op. "Do you support the French one-year timeline?" one reporter asked. Mr. Obama responded, "I already answered a question from you before."
Ah, he's finally learning a little about how to handle the press.
Another reporter asked Mr. Obama if he agreed with the French position on Palestine. Mr. Obama smiled and replied, "Bonjour." A third reporter queried if that response constituted a "no comment." The president's response: "No comment."
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#1
"There's a reason why the Palestinians are pursuing their interests at the United Nations," Mr. Obama said then. "They recognize that there is an impatience with the peace process, or the absence of one, not just in the Arab world, in Latin America, in Asia, and in Europe. And that impatience is growing, and it's already manifesting itself in capitals around the world."
I'm speechless--too bad Obummer wasn't. The Arrogant One is again offering an humble apology (apologizing not for himself, mind you, in as humble as he gets)for America's failures (blaming the evil "We the people" who defy him) to solve the world's problems, reluctantly ceding power to the UN...the natives may be restless but it is not the American people to blame!!!!! Why do I get this apocalyptic vision and dark feeling just reading this?
Getting a little crowded under that bus, isn't it?
UNITED NATIONS: US President Barack Obama, trying to avert a showdown on Palestinian statehood, told the United Nations on Wednesday there was no substitute for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations or a short cut to peace.
With US credibility and influence in the Middle East at stake,
Nah, it isn't at stake. We squandered it all a good while back...
Obama wants to dissuade the Palestinians from asking the UN Security Council for statehood in defiance of Israeli objections and a US veto threat. But they have shown no sign of renouncing their plan to stake their claim on Friday.
A year after telling the UN General Assembly he hoped to see a Palestinian state born by now, the US president said creating such a state alongside Israel remained his goal.
"But the question isn't the goal we seek -- the question is how to reach it. And I am convinced that there is no short cut to the end of a conflict that has endured for decades," Obama said.
"Peace will not come through statements and resolutions at the UN -- if it were that easy, it would have been accomplished by now," he said.
Well that and a few hundred billion in bribes...
"Ultimately, it is Israelis and Palestinians who must live side by side. Ultimately, it is Israelis and Palestinians -- not us -- who must reach agreement on the issues that divide them: on borders and security; on refugees and Jerusalem," he added.
Of course, the Israelis have to do what Bambi tells them to do...
However, it is the failure of 20 years of US-brokered negotiations that has driven Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to take his quest for statehood to the United Nations -- a move that threatens to embarrass the United States by forcing it to protect its Israeli ally against the tide of world opinion.
Obama's speech infuriated Palestinians. Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior Palestinian thug official, said Obama's remarks showed an inconsistent approach in praising Arab struggles for freedom, while making an "abstract call" for negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians.
"We expected to hear that the freedom of the Palestinian people was the key to the Arab spring," he said.
Then again, the Arab Spring looks as phony as the PLO...
Obama later met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and assured him that efforts to impose peace on Israel and the Palestinians would not work.
"I want to thank you, Mr. President, for standing with Israel and supporting peace," a beaming Netanyahu said as the two men met with a backdrop of US and Israeli flags on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly session.
Referring to Obama's vow to veto a Palestinian recognition appeal, possibly in the UN Security Council, Netanyahu said: "I think this is a badge of honor and I want to thank you for wearing that badge of honor."
Netanyahu hoped that despite intense political pressure, other world leaders would follow Obama and oppose any attempt by the Palestinians to raise the statehood issue in the Security Council.
In one of several frantic efforts to avert a diplomatic disaster, French President Nicolas Sarkozy proposed that the United Nations give the Palestinians status as a UN observer state while setting out a road map for peace within one year.
Any firm timetable favors the Paleos, which is why the Y'urp-peons are for it...
Sarkozy warned that any veto against Palestinian efforts to seek full statehood in the Security Council "risked engendering a cycle of violence" in the Middle East."
The United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations -- the "Quartet" of Middle East mediators -- are seeking a compromise, with no signs yet of success. The Security Council could also delay action on Abbas' request for weeks, giving the Quartet more time to come up with a statement that could coax both sides back to the table.
The Palestinians said they will give the Security Council "some time" to study their application. "We will give some time to the Security Council to consider first our full membership request before heading to the General Assembly," Nabil Shaath, a senior thug official in Abbas' Fatah party, told reporters.
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09/22/2011 00:00 ||
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A decade after 9/11 the West is afraid of infuriating Arabs and Muslims.
A decade after 9/11 Arabs and Muslims are not afraid of infuriating the West.
Demonstrators in defeated/liberated/whatever Afghanistan are chanting 'Death to America'; they're absolutely fearless. Ditto for the 'Palestinian Authority' that depends on Western taxpayer's largesse.
In spite of very real Western military successes in the last decade something went terribly wrong on the political track.
#9
Angry Palestinians? No news there. Palestinians putting aside centuries-old hatreds and dealing realistically with their problems in the here-and-now, that would be news.
The fact that Dear Leader walked willingly into this swamp is proof he is not as smart as he pretends.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, introduced the Solidarity with Israel Act today, a bill that would defund the United Nations if that body votes to recognize Palestine as a state.
This vote undermines Israels security, and should the United Nations change Palestines current status, this legislation would prevent valuable American resources from funding the United Nations," Hatch said. "Make no mistake, there will be consequences associated with efforts to undermine the security of Americas friends and allies."
The United States will veto any vote by the UN Security Council that recognizes Palestine as a state, but Hatch's bill would pull funding if the General Assembly voted to classify Palestine as an "observer state," which the United States cannot interdict.
#3
Note that it's predecessor the League and even now some offices were in Switzerland even though the Swiss were not members till 2002. As demonstrated, there is no reason for the host country to be a member.
VIENNA: Myanmar does not have enough economic strength to develop nuclear weapons, a senior diplomat from the military-ruled country told the UN atomic agency on Wednesday, rejecting any such suspicions in the West.
Last year, a UN report suggested that North Korea might have supplied the southeast Asian state as well as Iran and Syria with banned atomic technology.
The Norks seem to be willing to supply anyone...
In 2009, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she was concerned about the possible transfer of such technology to Myanmar from North Korea, which has left the nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty (NPT) and tested two nuclear devices.
But Tin Win, Myanmars ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), told its annual member state meeting: Myanmar would like to restate that Myanmar is in no position to consider the production and use of nuclear weapons and does not have enough economic strength to do so.
"But wait until we do," he added softly...
He told delegates that Myanmar in the past had made arrangements to carry out nuclear research with the help of Russia, but that this had been halted as the international community may mistunderstand the country over the issue. The aim of the research had been to ensure that it would not lag behind other countries in that field and to improve the applications of nuclear technology in its education and health sectors.
Myanmar has previously denied allegations by an exile group it was trying to develop atomic bombs and most analysts believe the isolated, impoverished nation remains well short of any goal to acquire nuclear capability.
But in January, Vienna-based diplomatic sources said the IAEA had written to Myanmar seeking information about its activities, suggesting it wanted to send inspectors there.
The IAEA: oh yeah, the same guys who said that Iran couldn't build and wasn't building a bomb...
A Norwegian-based exile group said in mid-2010 that Myanmar had a secret program dedicated to developing the means to make nuclear weapons, following up on similar allegations by defectors from the reclusive state.
The IAEA said at the time that it was looking into the report. Myanmar is a member of both the NPT and the IAEA.
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Summary: US$ 1 million bail/ransom for both, paid by the Sultanate of Oman. Relatives met them at the Oman airport, including hiking companion Sarah Shourd, released on bail earlier.
Ay Pee summarized: Exhibit of images of New York City children from various nations by Jewish photographer Danny Goldfield. Property developer Sharif El-Gamal says he handled things poorly last year, should have included community and 9/11 victim's families from the beginning. He has continued fundraising, but parted ways with the infamous Imam Rauf. Muslim services have nonetheless continued for the past two years.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Nobody wants 'em, 
A French police court has issued its first fines against two women charged with wearing the full-face covering Islamic niqab.
ISLAMABAD: I assured Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Robert Mueller that the Haqqanis are not on the Pakistani side, but if there was any intelligence, which was provided by the US, we would definitely take suitable action, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Wednesday. 
PARIS: A probe into alleged illegal campaign funding linked to a deadly 2002 Pakistan bombing drew closer to Nicolas Sarkozy, on Wednesday, with the French presidents best man and a former aide detained. 
September 22, 2011: Palestinian leaders are telling their followers that the UN will soon approve Palestinian use of terror against Israelis, even when it means killing women and children. One Palestinian official stated that the UN will back efforts to free Palestinians imprisoned by Israel for terror attacks. All this is supposed to happen when Palestine is allowed to join the UN. The Palestinian effort be obtain UN membership seems likely to succeed, and soon. This would not create a Palestinian state; it would simply make Palestine a member of the UN. This is a bizarre situation, but such things are not unknown in the UN.
